January 5, 2011

The recent case in Oklahoma should be a warning to us. The price of religious freedom is eternal vigilance—even and especially over our own government, which seems bent upon thoroughly scrubbing Christianity from the public square.

What happened at Oklahoma? Buried deep, very deep, in Section 202.4, General Rules, Paragraph 4(b), Section 1, Subsection ii of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (Regulation B), is a rather obscure directive. According to the purpose of the Act—"to promote the availability of credit on a nondiscriminatory basis"—the federal government has taken upon itself the task of prohibiting "acts or practices directed at prospective applicants that could discourage a reasonable person, on a prohibited basis, from applying for credit." Subsection ii prohibits "The use of words, symbols, models or other forms of communication in advertising that express, imply, or suggest a discriminatory preference or a policy of exclusion in violation of the Act."

There you have it! That gives the Federal Reserve Board the power to burst into a small-town bank and demand that all Christmas buttons, crosses, and Bible verses be stripped away immediately—or else. And if the feds believe they can do this, what will be next?

You might say, "Well, it turned out fine in the end. They backed down, and all is well." But that would be a poor lesson to take from this episode. The lessons we should take are the following.

First of all, if Christians hadn't spoken up—quickly, loudly, forcibly, and in sufficient number—the feds wouldn't have backed down. If Christians aren't prepared to be even more vigilant, then the wizened regulators will find new and stealthier ways to strip Christianity from public view. And if it can happen in small-town banks through obscure regulations, then it can happen anywhere.

Second, note again how deeply buried this provision is—a provision that, in effect, could be used with the same thoroughness of Marxists in the Soviet Union to remove all vestiges of Christianity from public life. How many of us have read the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, or even heard of it? How many of us could get down to Section 202.4, General Rules, Paragraph 4(b), Section 1, Subsection ii without falling into a dead sleep? How many of us, if we made it that far, would fathom the possibility that the bureaucratic jargon would be used by the secular-minded for their own purposes? That's a serious lesson. The secular revolutionaries are far more likely to use murky passages from obscure federal regulations to have their way precisely because bureaucrats aren't elected. They are almost entirely immune from that greatest of all democratic safeguards—the ability to throw someone out we've elected in.

Third, the language of the Act ensures that broad and indiscriminate powers can be used for very narrow and insidious ends stretching far beyond the words. Does a church next to a bank subtly suggest a discriminatory preference of the bank? Perhaps the knowledge that the head teller is a cantor in church? If you doubt the ability of the feds to press language beyond its original scope or intent, note that the provision cited as allegedly giving them powers to remove Christmas buttons, Bible verses, and crosses was aimed only and explicitly at "advertising," not at religious symbols or Bible verses innocently and cheerfully displayed within the bank, on its website, or on its employees. And don't think adding the proviso about "a reasonable person" will protect Christians because the secular-minded define reasonable on their own terms: a reasonable person is someone who believes that religion, especially Christianity, should be expunged from public life. Be assured that the federal regulators deemed themselves eminently reasonable, and all it would take is an equally reasonable federal judge to uphold their actions.

And that is the fourth lesson. Watch the judges. The mindset that could use Section 202.4, General Rules, Paragraph 4(b), Section 1, Subsection ii of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act to further the cause of de-Christianization is the same as that which has used the First Amendment's words that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion" to yank plaques of the Ten Commandments from schools and judicial chambers, prohibit prayers at high school graduation ceremonies, and snatch crèches from town squares. And that all occurred through federal courts. Ultimately, it is the federal judiciary that is the key instrument in furthering the cause of secularists because the judiciary declares its power over all law, its interpretation, and its implementation—and they are non-elected. That's why the small number of secular-minded use the judiciary to achieve their ends: they know that, since the majority of Americans are Christians, they could never have their way by the democratic process. Given how much religious freedom has been eliminated by the judiciary through the First Amendment, would it be any surprise if the defeat of the feds at the Oklahoma bank is followed up by a victory in the courts?